3 Common Website Mistakes Revealed Through SEO Audits

3 Common Website Mistakes Revealed Through SEO Audits

One of the advantages of being a dedicated SEO agency is that we audit hundreds of websites across dozens of niches. In almost all cases, clients who end up signing up for long-term SEO projects will go through an initial content and SEO audits. The results of these audits will drive the strategies and priorities for the next block of work that we undertake. Without completing an initial audit, it’s not possible to create an effective strategy.

There’s no shortage of blog posts out there advising how to perform a content audit on a website. Instead of repeating what has already been said, we’re going to focus on what the most common findings have been from website audits we have conducted for real clients. As an SEO Agency, we get to see websites of different shapes and sizes. The aim of this article is to reveal some of the most common findings across businesses of all shapes and sizes.

1. No Call To Action

The goal behind Every campaign that we perform is to drive relevant, high-converting traffic to your website. In some cases, websites have an established flow of traffic which they are struggling to convert into customers.

The functionality and purpose of a landing page should be immediately visible to any website visitor. What do you want the visitor to do? Where is the visitor being funnelled to?

We’ve audited hundreds of landing pages across countless niches and found that one shared trait is that many of these landing pages do not provide a clear direction for visitors. As a result, customers are leaving these pages without moving on to the next stage.

Even if you are a bricks and mortar store aiming to attract more visitors to a physical location, you need to have a call to action (CTA) that offers directions trading hours and other relevant information. It’s not enough to have organic visibility in the search engine results pages, you also need to be capitalising on every website visitor that you receive.

If you are a blog, ask yourself; where do you want customers to go next? Providing a clear direction with similar articles that readers can navigate to once they have finished what they are reading or watching will increase dwell time and reduce bounce rates.

Perhaps you’ve got an e-book that you would like visitors to download. At the end of your post, you can include a button that takes them to a learning page where they can download this content. The last thing you want to do is lose a visitor because you haven’t provided any clear direction.

2. Neglecting Local SEO

If your business is driven by local customers, you need to be making the most of local SEO. Local SEO has become somewhat of a buzzword in the search engine optimisation community. However, the role that it plays in growing small to medium local businesses cannot be overstated.

Local SEO is an incredibly effective way to attract a highly-motivated audience to your online business. It allows businesses to promote their products and services to local customers at a time when they are more likely to convert.

Claiming and optimising your Google my business listing is the most fundamental aspect of local SEO strategy. To put in perspective, if 56% of businesses aren’t even claiming their Google my business listing, imagine how many other local SEO opportunities they are missing.

Given that the understanding and implementation of local SEO is still at a very rudimentary level, there is a wealth of opportunity for businesses who capitalise on this market early on. Claiming your Google my business listing is a great starting. For local SEO however, it is just that — a starting point.

We’re not going to Delve into the process of local SEO in this article, however, here are a few areas to get you started:

Title tags and H tags

Title tags and ‘H tags’ are an important HTML element that can be customised to reflect the content of your webpage. Without changing the entire content of each web page, title tags and H2 tags are a great way to update pages and give them local characteristics.

Online Directories and Citations

There is more to online directories and local citations then just Google my business. Just like the Yellow Pages and white Pages which were the lifeblood of businesses in the 90s and early 2000s, claiming online citations and local directories a vital for your online presence. In addition to driving leads through online directories, they also serve as a way to diversify the backlink profile of a website.

While it is unlikely that any local citations I going to dramatically improve your backlink profile, it’s important to remember that a strong link profile doesn’t just happen with a few high authority guest posts. Local citations are an important stepping stone to link diversity.

Address Online Reviews

Burying your head in the sand isn’t the way to go. Online reviews, whether they are positive or negative, serve as an important trust signal for your website.

Many people use reviews as a way to form an impartial view of a business. Getting positive reviews on your Google my business page and Facebook page is a great way of crowdsourcing recommendations. Don’t be afraid to ask for reviews. If someone has had a good experience with your business, there’s a good chance that they would be happy to offer review.

Structured Data Markup

Sometimes referred to as schema mark-up, structured data mark-up can be added to the code of your website to provide search engines with more information about your business. Some of the information that they can improve include the products you sell, services you offer, reviews you’ve collected, and so on.

As of 2018, less than one-third of websites are using schema mark-up — and in the case that they are, most only using it for the basics. Schema mark-up is a great way to make your local business stand out from your competitors.

In addition to standing out from the competition, Google favours website then and structure data because it helps the spiders to better determine the content of your site.

3. Don’t Get Lost in Jargon

Perhaps the most common mistake we see with B2B businesses is they fail to explain things in a way which is going to be easy for visitors and prospective clients to understand. Just because you are the expert in your field doesn’t mean everyone visiting your website is going to be. In fact, in most cases, when businesses are searching for services it is because there is a lack of understanding within their own business.

When it comes to creating landing pages for B2B businesses, there is a very simple structure that should be followed.

Why should the prospective business care about your product?

How is your product or service going to improve the way that they do business?

What’s next? Having a simple call to action that a visitor can follow will drastically improve your chances of conversion

Use case studies and real results to bolster your case for prospective clients visiting your website. Not only does this establish trust, but it also provides a real-world example of how your product or services can enrich their business. Not everyone understands the jargon associated with your industry, but everyone understands tangible results.

Conclusion

The most common thing that we have found in auditing websites from all Industries and niches, is that no two websites at the same. It seems like a cliché, but every business that we have dealt with faces vastly different challenges for improving this search engine visibility. Working with an established SEO Agency with an emphasis on conversion optimisation can help your business to identify opportunities for organic growth and ways to capitalise on existing traffic sources.